Junior bankers at Goldman Sachs may finally be able to afford dinner at Chipotle. The Wall Street behemoth has increased its daily dinner allowance to $30 from $25 — two months after The Post reported staff were griping they couldn’t even buy a Chipotle dinner with the stingy stipend. Goldman, headed by hard-charging CEO David Solomon, on Tuesday confirmed to The Post that employees working long hours and staying late at the office can now spend $30 on dinner but declined further comment. While this is the first time the bank has increased the stipend since the financial crisis of 2008, the bank noted that it has begun offering free breakfast and lunch since the pandemic. Litquidity, a closely watched blog for the financial set, had compiled comprehensive data on dinner allowances across Wall Street. It found Goldman bankers were stuck in the $25 club alongside overworked peers at lower-tier and overseas banks including Citi, Deutsche Bank, Barclays, Credit Suisse and Jefferies. That’s at the chintzy end of Wall Street. By comparison, Morgan Stanley provides $35 for meals, while at JPMorgan the rate is $30, the survey found. “In February, we called for David Solomon to increase the meal allowance for employees working late, as it was significantly below other banks,” Mark Moran, head of growth and operations at Litquidity, told The Post. “We’re happy to see that he has made the decision to increase his employee’s dinner allowance as GS returns fully to the office.” Goldman bankers previously griped that they were forced to leg it to local chains like Sweetgreen because the cost of delivery with tip, taxes and fees typically takes the price of a salad or Chipotle bowl past the $25 limit. Some analysts previously had to pool meal orders together and order from the same restaurant in an effort to defray delivery costs. Analysts and associates complained they were being nickel-and-dimed even as their bosses pulled down millions, sources told The Post. Meanwhile, rampant inflation has sent the cost of Chipotle up 10% over the last year.
